Hello,

I’m looking for a designer to help refine and develop the visual direction for a growing collection of children’s journals and books under my brand, The Montessori Made Co.

I’ve completed my first guided journal, Where My Worries Go: A Journal for the Things on My Mind, and I’m preparing it for Amazon KDP. The manuscript, prompts, sequence, and initial Canva design are already complete. I am not looking for a full redesign. I’m looking for a professional design review and thoughtful refinement that helps the book feel more polished, cohesive, intentional, and professionally published.

The visual direction I want to preserve is warm, calm, timeless, thoughtful, natural, modern, tactile, inviting, and child centered. I want these to feel like beautiful books that happen to be for children, rather than classroom worksheets or traditional activity books.

For Where My Worries Go, I’d like help with:

• Reviewing the existing design and providing professional feedback

• Refining the cover and interior where needed

• Improving typography, spacing, hierarchy, and overall consistency

• Making sure the finished book feels polished and ready for publication

• Preparing the design with Amazon KDP printing requirements in mind

For The Montessori Made Co., I’d also like help with:

• Establishing a recognizable visual style for future books and journals

• Creating a consistent font, color, and typography system

• Creating reusable Canva templates for covers and interior pages that I can continue using independently

• Creating a simple brand and book design guide

• Helping organize my Canva workspace and create a system that is easy to maintain

• Making sure future books feel connected without looking identical

This is intended to become a collection of thoughtful children’s journals exploring worries, confidence, mistakes, friendship, resilience, identity, and other parts of growing up. Each book should have its own personality while still feeling like part of The Montessori Made Co. family. I want them to feel like sister books, not identical books.

I will continue developing the concepts, writing, prompts, educational content, and overall creative direction myself. I’m looking for someone who can give that work a professional visual foundation and create systems that make it easier for me to continue designing and growing the collection independently.

All final files should be editable in Canva, and all fonts, graphics, illustrations, and other design elements must be commercially licensed for use in books and products.

I’m especially interested in designers with experience in children’s publishing, book cover design, editorial layout, typography, Amazon KDP, and Canva.

Please include relevant portfolio examples, especially children’s books, journals, workbooks, editorial layouts, or book covers.

I will provide a part of the journal PDF (minus the cover) and a detailed creative brief.

When responding, please tell me:

• How you would approach the first phase

• What you would evaluate first before making design changes

• What you would recommend as the starting scope

• Your estimated budget and timeline

• Whether you are comfortable working in Canva and delivering organized, editable files